


into the deep blue

by englishsummerrain



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Childhood Friends, M/M, Mutual Pining, Post-Graduation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-01
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:22:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27327256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/englishsummerrain/pseuds/englishsummerrain
Summary: Time is inevitable, but Jeno still wishes. Every chance he gets, every candle snatched by the wind. Every birthday.Always the same wish.
Relationships: Lee Jeno/Na Jaemin
Comments: 29
Kudos: 148





	into the deep blue

_And through my shoes you'll feel my heartbeat;_

_a thousand miles trekked through your streets_

80 Reasons Why — Mallcops

“Do you think we’ll keep in touch?”

Jeno yelps, not expecting Jaemin’s voice — not expecting him to crack open the door of the ensuite and ask him the question that’s been rolling around his head ever since their exams ended. Ever since they packed up and hopped on a twenty pound flight to the Mediterranean, trading Glaswegian skies for the northern coast of Egypt.

It’d been balmy and brisk yesterday, breeze blowing off the sea tempering the heat of the summer, but today Jaemin had taken one step out of their BnB and loudly declared _‘nope’_ before turning on his heel and heading back up the steps, expecting Jeno to follow.

And he did. Sitting in front of the AC, lying hip to hip on the double bed together. No shirts, no shorts — just their boxers, Jaemin’s laptop open in front of them, watching old cartoons while Jeno’s heart tangled into circles. At one point Jaemin had lifted a foot and run his toes along Jeno’s calf, and Jeno had glanced at him, only to find Jaemin’s eyes were still glued to the screen, a small catlike grin on his face.

Around three he’d gone out to get food, grabbing two hearty bowls of _fūl_ with hard boiled eggs and hummus from a restaurant a block over, stomach rumbling even as the sweat had poured off his back.

Always following. Unpacking the food and peeling the paper from the disposable cutlery, listening to Jaemin chattering along about the catacombs they were supposed to be visiting tomorrow. Their flight to Cairo was the day after, and after that it was destination God-knows-where — wherever the wind took them, like throwing a dart at the map.

“Barcelona could be nice,” Jaemin says, spooning his dish into his mouth, chewing, something flecked across his skin. By the end of this holiday he’ll be tanned and wind kissed, eyes sparkling, every part of him aglow. More beautiful than ever before. Now he's bending over the kitchen table, fanning his face, sweat shining on his bare skin. The heat here is nothing like it ever was in Scotland, and they both can barely take it — already Jeno wants to go back home.

He wants to never say goodbye. Sit in his childhood bedroom, swing on the swingsets he and Jaemin had played on as six year olds. Hope that somehow, somehow, they’ll survive this.

“What about Sicily? Haven’t you always wanted to visit?”

Jaemin took Italian in high school. Jeno took French, but it’s a moot point. He isn’t as forceful as Jaemin — isn’t as much of a whirlwind. Or maybe it’s that Jeno is happy to compromise — to go wherever Jaemin wants to. After all, Jaemin is leaving Europe. Going back to Korea — back, like he hadn’t been born in Scotland, too. Back to his father’s father’s homeland — back to where his blood ran deep.

“Still Scottish,” he’d said, poring over the jobs section, mouthing out the shapes of the words — Korean a language so familiar to his tongue but foreign to his eyes.

Here, somewhere else — far away from any home — they don’t talk about that. They talk about the now.

“Sicily would _also_ be nice,” Jaemin says, gesturing with his spoon. Eyebrows raised, everything about him so familiar it makes Jeno ache. The curve of his mouth, soft ‘o’, every part of him like a painting come to life. He should be hanging in a gallery somewhere, talked about for thousands of years. “Or we could do both. Sicily, Rome. Venice. Naples. I’ve always wanted to try real Italian pasta. Fresh from the vine tomatoes, peaches off the trees. All that stuff.”

He knows it’s for his benefit that Jaemin mentions the food, because food to Jaemin is a means to an end. It keeps him going.

Food to Jeno, on the other hand, is a reason to live.

“Sicily would be wonderful,” Jeno says, and Jaemin books the tickets then and there. Jeno opposite him, savouring every bite of his food, sunlight streaming through the windows, sounds of the city echoing around them. Hip-hop from shuddering car stereos, shouts in Arabic mingling through the bass. Car horns, engines rumbling. Hawkers and tourists, the sea so close Jeno can see a wink of the brilliant blue through a gap in the buildings. Waves glittering, gulls circling.

A big wide world, and they’re just two boys in a kitchen.

They go out again — after the sun has far passed its zenith, when everything is cooling off, sky painted a bruised purple that faded to a darkness so thick it was almost blue. Walking along the Corniche, waves crashing against the rock. Jeno hops up on the wall and walks along beside Jaemin, and the traffic rushes on beside them — the music from the cars almost drowned out by that playing from the balconies on the apartments opposite. People hanging from the railings, shouting and cheering, clatter of bottles, chatter of happiness. Dry heat still sticky, sweat still pouring down his back, but when he looks down at Jaemin it all seems to fall away.

 _Don’t go,_ he wants to say, even though it seems ridiculous. It’s nothing he should need to say, because Jaemin has always been there. Half a world’s distance isn’t enough to take him from him. Half the universe’s distance, he’s sure, and they’d still find a way to come back together. He believes in it with all the conviction he can muster — with every cell in his tiny little body. Every piece of stardust that made up his bones and blood — aligned in the belief that Jaemin would always return to him.

Their hands brush as Jeno reaches up to punch in the code for the gate, and laughter bubbles up in his throat. Fireworks in his stomach, alcohol warm. The night’s food had been good — bought from a street vendor that had called Jeno ‘mister’ and made him talk slow just so he could understand his patter. They’d sat on the waterfront and Jeno had hummed along to the music playing from the apartment block behind them, eating the pita stuffed with falafel slowly, licking the yogurt from his fingers, enjoying every second. Trying to commit Jaemin’s laughter to memory.

Jaemin takes the first shower. He’s quick — in and out, water trickling down his bare chest, rolling onto the bed beside Jeno again and poking him with his foot. Jeno washes the dust from his hair and the salt from his lips, toweling off in front of the steamy mirror and brushing his teeth, pulling on a tank top and then — then comes Jaemin.

That fucking question. There’s still a sparkle in his eyes but there’s something about it that aches — like a star going out, a light show as a last hurrah.

“Of course,” Jeno says. He has to be sure of it — to answer automatically. Have unwavering faith that yes, they’ll never lose touch. “Why wouldn’t we?”

“I’m just…” he starts, and he pauses. Leaning against the worn white of the doorframe, window open, all this life around them. The world is so big, and they’re so small. “I don’t know. It just scares me sometimes. Thinking of a life without you.”

And there it is.

“Yeah,” Jeno says, and it’s like his heart bursts into overdrive — thundering dangerously, blood hot under his skin. Something twisting between his ribs, because he doesn’t know how he can live without Jaemin, either. “Me too.”

Then what, really?

It’s a moment of truth — hanging between them. Steam billowing around Jeno, water clinging to his skin like a film. Jaemin’s hair still looks damp, and he looks breathtaking — even so forlorn. Every mole on his chest, the smattering of hair around his navel, shorts slung low, all his muscles and his scars and his beautiful, beautiful eyes.

“We keep saying we won’t but…” Jaemin says.

“You don’t want to say you don’t believe it, but you’re afraid?” Jeno offers, and his heart hitches when Jaemin nods. In tune without trying — always on the same wavelength. The same fear, crawling up his throat like a great shadow.

“Yeah,” Jaemin says. “God, Jeno. I don’t know what to do.”

He moves to cross the space — bare feet on the slick tiles — and Jeno catches him halfway. Opening his arms, Jaemin crumpling against him. A shudder and a shake and Jeno hates to cry — Jeno doesn’t cry. Jaemin has always been the one who cried between them — like he took Jeno’s tears for himself. His open heart, raw against the harsh bite of the world. They shared so many things — it would seem right that they shared the burden of sadness between them.

The last time Jeno had cried was when he’d seen the northern lights — standing in the winter with Jaemin, Jaemin clinging to him, breath frosty against his bare chin. Lit up in blue and green, angels dancing across the stars.

He knows in the second Jaemin falls into his arms he’ll have to reset that timer.

“It’s okay,” Jeno says. What else can he say? “Come on, remember what we promised each other in year two?”

“That we’d be best friends forever,” Jaemin says, and it’s watery. His bare skin is warm under Jeno’s hands and he holds him so close it’s like he wishes they could become one — melt into each other, like every other part of them isn’t linked before.

“Right. And the Jaemin Na I know doesn’t break promises, does he?”

“No,” Jaemin shakes his head. His hands ball into fists, grasping at the fabric of Jeno’s shirt. “He doesn’t. But he was seven when he promised that, and he doesn’t know if he’s the same person anymore.”

“We can’t be the same people forever,” Jeno says, even though he so desperately wishes he could. Never change, never move. Exist with Jaemin forever — this bond they forged between them ironclad. This boy he’s loved so long he’s not sure how to breathe without him — like they share not only their lives but their blood. Their hearts and their lungs, always moving in tandem. Waking up in the middle of the night and hearing him breathe and knowing it will all be okay. Bone deep, sure as the sun would rise.

He remembers his eighteenth birthday. It was spring and it was cold — raining outside. His party was on the weekend, but on the day itself Jaemin had biked all the way up the hill and arrived at his house sopping wet with his present — a small cake from Tesco and a pair of Adidas sneakers they’d eyed up last time they’d gone into the city proper together. Jeno had toweled him off like he was a soggy dog and they’d sat at the dining table together, steady drip of Jaemin’s rain jacket serving as their background music.

Sitting at the table together, no other lights turned on, only the glow of the candles Jeno had dug out from a draw in the kitchen, Jeno had made a wish. Carried on his breath like cosmic winds, exhaled into the universe.

He’d always believed in the power of magic. From when he was just a kid to then — to now. The Jeno in his kitchen and the Jeno in Egypt right now — they both hope for something wondrous in the world. That all those ancient forces people always sung about were true — that love was the most powerful thing in the universe.

“What did you wish for?” Jaemin had asked him, and Jeno had smiled.

“It doesn’t come true if I tell you,” he’d said.

Now he can feel the threads fraying. Growing up was like losing that magic — learning that your mother wasn’t a superhero, but just a human being like you. That all your heroes were not who you thought they were, and that everyone fucks up. Sometimes people let you down. Sometimes people drift apart. You’ll never be sixteen again, or eighteen, or twenty. Time is inevitable, but Jeno still wishes. Every chance he gets, every candle snatched by the wind. Every birthday.

Always the same wish.

“I know we can’t,” Jaemin says. Jeno’s fingers fit along the length of his spine, and he holds him so tight he thinks he must be able to hear his thoughts — read it in his heartbeat. A mother tongue, the way the two of them work. “But I want us to change together. I want — sometimes I don’t want to go to Korea, Jeno. I don’t want to leave you behind.”

“You can’t give yourself up for me.”

(His wishes are selfish, but he thinks they won’t ever come true. They’re selfish because he isn’t — because it’s so hard to put himself before Jaemin.)

“But what if I did?”

“Jaemin.”

The shower drips, and Jeno could almost mistake the dampness on his shoulder for its lingering moisture. Cleansing, only to be dipped into the water anew. Thrown into the deep blue ocean, only Jaemin to cling to.

“What if I did?”

“I can’t let you do that for me.”

Jaemin looks up at him, and it’s defiant. A streak of fire, the boy who’d threatened to fight the skies more than once. Standing on the front steps of Jeno’s house, snowflakes falling around him. Standing in the sun, fist raised. End of the Earth together, and all that.

“You can’t make me. I don’t care. I’ll stay here if it means I don’t lose you.”

Standing in the kitchen, water dripping around them. Three pound cake in his hand, drooping slightly. Cursing the spring weather for opening up on him, like the sky was crying. Cursing biking back, before Jeno offered to let him stay. A double bed, but Jaemin has never known how to keep his space.

And Jeno hoping for his wish to come true. For, like everything else, Jaemin to feel the same way as him. Thunderstorms, wind battering the daffodils in the flower box.

“You’re not afraid, are you?” Jeno had asked, and Jaemin had kicked at him.

(Again. It all comes full circle.)

Walking out through the ensuite, back into the bedroom. Sitting down on the bed together, and falling sideways. No raindrops, just the Mediterranean wind, just the sun’s lingering kiss. More scared than the skies could have ever made him, because this is real and now. This is Jeno closing his eyes and opening them at the same time as Jaemin, and Jaemin laughs, watery. A little drunk, a little dizzy.

“It’s 11:11,” he says. Jeno doesn’t look at the clock. He just believes him. “Make a wish?”

They hold each other’s gaze. Easy as it’s ever been.

“Did you?” Jeno asks, and Jaemin nods. He’s not crying anymore, but there’s a wistfulness in his eyes. Hope, fading like a choked flame.

“I’ll tell you if you tell me?”

“It won’t come true if I do,” Jeno says.

“What’s the point. I don’t think it’ll ever come true. Might as well say it out loud, right?”

Jaemin was wishing, too. Of course he was. Mirror images, shadows dancing in time. Always entwined, one way or another. Not a step behind, but moving with the music, the two of them like they made their own beat.

“You never know,” Jeno says, and he doesn’t want to betray that he’s wished for so long, too.

“No, but…” Jaemin says, and he lifts a hand, fitting it to Jeno’s cheek — thumb against his jawbone, palm warm. Brushing against his skin, a long sigh. “You.”

Another car blasting past — more music. More shouts. People below the window shouting in languages he didn’t know. Joyful, merry.

“I what?” Jeno says, tilting his head into Jaemin’s touch.

“That was my wish,” Jaemin says, and his voice cracks, his touch so delicate. Bold and brash, but shivering. “I wished for you.”

“Then stay,” Jeno says, and he’s shaking, too.

“Tell me what you wished for, Jeno,” Jaemin says. “And I’ll stay.”

A thunderstorm in his ribcage, and Jeno breathes deep. He doesn’t need to speak his wish. He doesn’t need to say it. It’s already come true.

**Author's Note:**

> i have been so afflicted with nomin brainworms i'm glad to finally get SOMETHING down on a page.
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/dongrenle) & [cc.](https://curiouscat.me/goldhorn)


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